The present invention relates to an electronic document management system for and more particularly to such a system that exploits advanced document analysis techniques.
Electronic creation, editing, and storage of documents has become commonplace. However, paper documents remain important and the processes of printing, faxing, and copying are still central to document distribution and management. The reasons for the continued centrality of paper are varied. Paper documents are easy to review and annotate, portable, and in fact represent a "universal standard" for display, a goal yet tantalizingly out of reach in the electronic world.
Current document management techniques do not acknowledge the continued use of paper or the reasons for it. For example, consider existing systems for storage and retrieval of electronic documents. Typically, a document is specified for retrieval by navigation through a hierarchical directory structure and reference to a file name. However, if the hierarchical directory structure and accompanying file names are not created with great care, retrieving a desired document becomes very difficult because it will be nearly impossible to identify. Studies of electronic filing have found that users usually fail to put in the effort to establish proper electronic filing schemes, often because the effort required is not justified by the value of the information.
By contrast, paper documents are inherently recognizable by appearance. A quick glance is all that is required. Proper filing of paper documents for later retrieval requires a certain administrative discipline but the retrieval process itself is facilitated because paper files themselves are recognizable by titles on their face and by the appearance of their contents.
Present electronic document comparison procedures, i.e., procedures designed to highlight the differences between two versions of a document, are ill-suited for the hybrid world of electronic and paper documents. They assume that both versions of a document to be compared are available electronically and may be readily identified, conditions that are often not satisfied. For example, geographically dispersed authors using two different word processors may communicate with paper hardcopy drafts. Furthermore, it may be difficult to identify and retrieve a previous electronic version of a document for the reasons given above.
What is needed is an electronic document management system that recognizes the continued use of paper documents while facilitating electronic document filing and document comparison.